16 Apr 2018

Base Camp Manager?

I am Secretary in one of my toastmasters clubs, so I found myself suddenly: Base Camp Manager. So what? I told myself. I did knew for some time that beside the main Base Camp Manager, BCM, the Vice President of Education, the President and the Secretary will be also BCM. So? If the VPE is not ready or able, I could approve Levels. Levels? For those new to Pathways, we do have in it 10 paths and in each path 5 levels of increasing complexity. I went to open Base Camp, this is what I found from 20 March on, the launch day in UK.

Access my path through Base Camp, look: Log in as a Member (did many times) or as a Base Camp Manager. Finally, a day I did log in as BCM and again, I thought, so what ? I will approve Levels when needed. As we just begun, till time arrives, the VPE will do it.

This three tiles you get when you login as Base camp manager in the Base Camp. Most often, as the toastmasters progress, you will open - if possible day by day - the Pending Request. With a click, the Level 1 (or 2 later etc) is approved and the Toastmaster can continue to the next level.So if you want to stick to the basics, as I did last year, as Secretary in another club, you could just stick to the first tile and Approve a Level by one click where you see the circle. Unless the Toastmaster arrived there by mistake or curiosity, no reason not to approve it.

When you have time and want to dig farther, you can discover who had chosen a Path and did not get it even open, and get to speak with them and see what help they need.But this weekend I thought I will look farther, as I had enjoyed a Video in youTube that showed us some features and curiosities of the BCM and what he could see. So, I clicked on the middle square : Member Progress. To see anything first, I had to "refresh" in the upper right corner. It takes a while, then it becomes up to date.

Path and indication if they are only "Registered" (chosen) or "In Progress" or "Completed". As for now, only some of my paths are completed, as I have been on them for a year. I could also see which ones, and then who did not even open their path, and also who had spend already 2 hours on his Icebreaker project (I heard him last time give a wonderful speech from it).

After his speech, he marked it complete. I could even see as Base Camp Manager, then he has spend 2 hours and 35 minutes through it! A lot more informations then I suspected before. I could even see (I had no clue) how many hours I have spend on my recent Managing Change Project, that I did not yet complete : almost an hour! Could it be true? Reading it again and later again, possible.

I could also discover Don's and my Transcript what I accessed lately. Some "classes" explaining what and how : Training or Tutorials I would call them, and the path I opened last, called "Curriculum". I could even see only one type and sort by different criteria. All that seen with the Base Camp Manager eyes.

So, as a Base Camp manager I could only look from afar, opening a bit the window, as in the middle I did home last week. Or see very near in detail as left here, or go "down" to see the flowers that I just glimpsed at in the middle picture from afar.

I remembered today, why I got disinterested last time. Not only because I was only a Remote member and did not know most of those needing perhaps help, but also all those "hovering" popups. This View Details Export or Refresh, shows only if you hover in the right place, inside the big rectangle of the Path Progress, and some others infos that you can get too. Of course, once you know... as always, it could become a skill and you do it. In the upper right corner seeming far away in this picture, the options lets you get details, with names and print or export the information. Also discovered, while a Base Camp Manager does not have information indeed what is in the E-Portifolio (they all seem as having nothing in it), they can see your Profile with the latest roles you added in it, your Badges also. More to discover another time. In the third tile, Manager Tutorials, and there are a lot of them. Even me with my curiosity did not try out all.Conclusion? You have tools as Base Camp Manager that can enable to help those who need it, or just fast approve when they have completed the usual three projects of a Level.